This is a standalone novel - not a Nero Wolfe. It was later republished under the title The Sound of Murder. According to Wikipedia (See this page) there is only one other work featuring Alphabet Hicks: a short story titled "His Own Hand" which also appears in anthologies under the title "Curtain Line". Also note the linked Wikipedia page incorrectly places this title under "Works related to Nero Wolfe" - but there is no relation at all.
About the author: Rex Stout (1886 – 1975) was an American writer noted for his detective fiction. His best-known characters are the detective Nero Wolfe and his assistant Archie Goodwin, who were featured in 33 novels and 39 novellas between 1934 and 1975. (wikipedia). (bibliography)
Major characters:
- Alphabet Hicks, disbarred lawyer
- Judith Dundee, accused of selling out her husband
- Richard I. Dundee, her husband, owner of the plastics factory
- Ross Dundee, their son, a technician in the factory
- Herman Brager, an engineer in the factory
- Heather Gladd, a secretary in the factory
- Martha Cooper, Heather's sister
- George Cooper, her husband
- Jimmy Vail, a competitor
Locale: Katonah, New York
Synopsis: Disbarred lawyer Alphabet Hicks is driving a NYC taxicab, and picks up a fare, Judith Dundee. She recognizes his name and hires him to fix a touchy issue: her husband, Richard I. Dundee, has accused her of selling his business secrets on plastics manufacturing to a competitor, Jimmy Vail. She claims innocence, but her husband says he has proof - in the form of a phonograph record (which they call a sonograph plate) containing a conversation between her and Vail.
Hicks encounters another woman - Martha Cooper - and initially thinks she is Judith, as she has an identical voice. Hicks follows her to Katonah, NY, site of Dundee's plastics factory. She goes to the house on the site, which is occupied by Heather Gladd (secretary), Herman Brager (engineer), Ross Dundee (a technician, and Richard's son), and Mrs. Powell, a housekeeper.
Hicks suspects that the voice on the record may really be Martha Cooper, which would let Judith off the hook. Before he can investigate, Martha is found dead outside the factory; and the record is nowhere to be found. Her husband, George Cooper, arrives on the scene - and soon he is dead also.
Review: All through this book I thought I must be reading Erle Stanley Gardner. Gardner has a similarly-named lawyer (A.B.C. Carr) in his Doug Selby series. The action is like Gardner also. Hicks is quirky but quite at home dealing with the authorities, somewhat a disorganized Archie Goodwin.
As soon as I found the plot involved a sound recording, I suspected a sneaky trick as in Agatha Christie's The Murder of Roger Ackroyd (1926) - but thankfully - it does not. The recording does play a part in the solution, but is not as simple as being either Judith Dundee or Martha Cooper. Let's just say that manipulating media files is nothing new!
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